Improved metadata handling in Audacity

[petersampsonaudacity]

Metadata support is known to be patchy in Audacity.

• [x] #3188
• [ ] #2175
• [ ] #1944
• [ ] #1696
• [ ] #1620
• [ ] #1508
• [ ] #1506
• [ ] #1505
• [ ] #678
• [ ] #5825
• [x] #5494

Some (or all) of these may be fixed in future releases, but there aren't any concrete plans as of now.

Original report

Discussed in https://github.com/audacity/audacity/discussions/947

^{Originally posted by petersampsonaudacity June 1, 2021} Audacity really needs some attention paying to its handling of metadata (inbound and outbound). Metadata support is known to be patchy in Audacity.

1. there are several (currently 11 at time of writing - now 13) unfixed metadata bugs listed in the Bugzilla bugtracker: https://bugzilla.audacityteam.org/buglist.cgi?quicksearch=metadata&list_id=28314

This is a prime example: Bug 701 - Metadata: Embedded album art and lyrics metadata discarded https://bugzilla.audacityteam.org/show_bug.cgi?id=701 This bug has lain untended/unfixed for seven and a half years

2. There is also a discussion proposal from 2018 in our Wiki: https://wiki.audacityteam.org/wiki/Proposal_Metadata_Options

3. We often get posts on the Forum about poor handling of metadata - this latest example from today is the one that triggered me to write this up: https://forum.audacityteam.org/viewtopic.php?f=50&t=118012

Part of the problem is there is no universal standard for all metadata fields. Audacity does handle consistently the fields that are there by default in the metadata editor - but additional fields are not always handled properly/consistently - for example album art and lyrics are just discarded as stated above in Bug 701.

[petersampsonaudacity]

Today the Album art metadata bit me - and it really is very annoying, I can fully understand why users get upset about this one: Bug 701 - Metadata: Embedded album art and lyrics metadata discarded https://bugzilla.audacityteam.org/show_bug.cgi?id=701

I have several audio files lying on my desktop for QA testing use, they all have nice album art which shows as the icon on the desktop for rapid identification and use.

One recent QA test involved

1. Import an AAC (with album art metadata) file into Audacity
2. process it as part of QA testing
3. Export it back out to same location (this was the actual QA test after a Forum complaint)
4. Observe: the nice album art is lost - just abandoned and thrown away by Audacity

[petersampsonaudacity]

I have marked this as a High Priority bug as some of those metadata bugs (in particular the discarding of a user's carefully added album art) is a data loss - and we have always regarded data loss as serious issue.

[petersampsonaudacity]

I have transferred the major metadata bugs and enhancements from Bugzilla (and closed the Bugzilla entries - leaving links from the new GitHub entries)

1. Metadata: Embedded album art and lyrics metadata discarded #1505
2. Metadata: custom entries are ignored by Audacity on export #1506
3. Metadata: Export Multiple substitutes default metadata for user-entered metadata #1507
4. Enh: Metadata - FLAC export lacks seekpoints and metadata padding #1508

[dougbreaux]

So the behavior where I use ffmpeg to add album_artist and can see it there in the Audacity export dialog under "Album Artist", but it's actually missing from the exported mp3, this is due to these issues in Audacity, correct? I was looking for what I'm doing wrong. (Also confirmed with mp3tag before and after, BTW.)

[Zeit08]

Are there any news about the labels->chapters feature #678? It would be great for podcasters!

[Lycanthrope-R]

Just thought I'd throw in here that as of 3.4.2, Audacity seems to be reading "Album Artist" metadata as "Album Title" metadata for imported M4A files, overwriting the actual Album name. It's not great.